See this face right here? She's on my people to fight list.

This is the reason why people are so skeptical of broadcast "jornalism." Not that I watch a lot of Nancy Grace ... or that I watch Nancy Grace at all. However, I've seen plenty YouTube evidence of her getting preachy and condescending at her guests. I'm pretty sure that Larocque can back me up on this since he actually watches Nancy Grace—for the irony and fun of course.

So it should come as no surprise to me when I found out her opinion on Scott Peterson's prison menu—or that she has an opinion on Scott Peterson's prison menu at all. Mr Peterson, in case you don't know or remember, is on death row for murdering his pregnant wife. (It shortly replaced all the JonBenet reporting in the supermarket tabloids. Though I think those tabloids are back on JonBenet-watch again. What a dedicated and tenacious bunch!)

GRACE: Hi. What would Scott Peterson be doing right now on death row?

CRITTENDON (Public Information Officer of San Quentin prison): Well, right now, our death row inmates, they`ve just completed eating their evening meal that has been served to them, and probably in the next 20 minutes or so, the staff will be picking up those evening trays and finishing up with the evening meal.

GRACE: Vernell, explain to me, do they eat in their cells on San Quentin death row, or do they eat in a cafeteria? How does that work?

CRITTENDON: Well, all of our death row inmates, they eat in their cells alone. The cells, they are a single cell. They`re about 42 square foot of space inside of their cells.

GRACE: You mean they get room service, Vernell?

CRITTENDON: That's it, door-to-door service. We bring meals to them.

GRACE: Wow! So Vernell, what`s on the menu tonight at San Quentin?

CRITTENDON: This evening, the men here at San Quentin are going to be having a broiled chicken on the bone with some rice, a garden salad, a roll, and they`re going to get a small cup of ice cream for dessert.

GRACE: OK, wait a minute. Scott Peterson is having ice cream for dessert? Did I just hear that?

CRITTENDON: They get a balanced meal here at the Department of Corrections.

GRACE: Can't they just get a calcium supplement? Do they have to have a bowl of ice cream?

[source]

Wow! It's nice to know that Ms Grace is a crusader of justice and punishment. It's probably a good thing that the prison chef didn't debone the chicken breast or serve it with some sauce from a can. Next thing you know, she'll probably demand Scott Peterson to sit in his corner facing the wall until they strap him down to the chair. Or, she'll make sure Scott Peterson does not get to request anything fancier than an unheated box of TV dinner as his last meal. The American penitentiary system is probably going to shit if it weren't for the vigilant monitoring that she provides.

Ms Grace probably should stick to what she does best: cable news specials on missing white girls and making white girls cry by asking incessantly about the time she got kidnapped. Real sensitive, that one.

This picture will seem extra dirty after you read the post

I just got off the phone with Ms Peaches and let me tell you, I am more than slightly aroused. Now I never usually get all fan-boy on my interview subjects' asses (save for Kathleen Edwards which, as Iris can attest to, I was giggling and blushing at work for two days straight after I talked to her last summer and at least two more days after I met her in person and she said she loved-- and even quoted from--my article), but from the moment Peaches said, "Hey," I was all giggly and mushy once again. Seriously, I'm not totally gay, but she has to be one of the only "gay icons" I actually appreciate. We talked about her pubic hair, her underarm hair, her facial hair--lots of talk about hair--and her latest radtacularly-titled record "Impeach My Bush" and how straight men are in desperate need of a sexual revolution. "They should be able to shake their dicks like we shake our tits," was one of the best, if not stereotypically Peaches, quotes. I also inquired about Feist aka MC BitchLapLap and if she will be making a cameo during Peaches upcoming Edmonton show. Peaches said she didn't know but is going to give Feist a call to see what the deal is. Seriously, wouldn't that be so supercool if an idea I put into her head actually came to fruition? I would have an orgasm then die because the orgasm I just had was that intense.

Sneakers, autographs, a trampy girl, more sneakers and an all-star game. Four days of stalking Steve Nash

In typical O'Leary fasion, here's the rest of my Steve Nash weekend, five days after I promised it.

Wednesday proved to be a letdown. After I had built up the idea of the interview in my head for three weeks, I was lumped into a pile of bottom feeders who had three minutes to split questions up with Nash. While not a one on one, a three on one is better than nothing; though it's close. Later that night, I got to meet Olu Ashaolu (pictured, getting interviewed by the Score), the kid I wrote on last year for Slam. Him and the other kids at the camp had a scrimmage against the U-17 BC team. Little did I know, that was the last day of the camp, which left me with little to do until the Nash game on Saturday.



Due to a misreading of the schedule, I missed a press conference on Friday, where Nash talked about being excited for the game. A shocking development. I ran into the lady who was setting up more one on one interviews with Nash and I tried to get a few minutes with him. It was here I learned two things: a) this lady did not like/have time for me, and b) without this lady's help, I was screwed. I was stuck outside of the press room where Nash was doing sit downs with CBC and TSN with these two kids (maybe 20 years old) who ran a web board or something out of Victoria. They were an odd pair. The girl was borderline albino and underdeveloped. She was wearing a Carmelo Anthony high school jersey and a skirt. The guy looked like Sacramento Kings PG Mike Bibby and had coffee breath. They were looking for pics and autographs from players who were supposed to be coming down to get headshots for the game. The only one who came down was the Mavs' Devin Harris. I tried to keep my distance from the two of them, as I didn't want to get lumped in with them as fans. I don't think it worked. Then things got weird with them. They had a third guy with them, who was really quiet and kind of uninvolved. Seemed like he was just there for something to do. The girl goes over to him, puts her arms around his neck and kind of rubs his back and kisses him. So they're dating, no big deal, right? 20 minutes later or so, the other guy goes up to the girl, puts his hands on her thighs, leans in and kisses her. In the words of Ray from Trailer Park Boys, "What in the fuck!??!" I was officially weirded out. I called it a day.

The trip was turning out to be a big waste. I had spent a lot of money to fly out, the camp was cut short, which killed my hopes of getting a story or two out of it, and I hadn't gotten to interview Nash like I had wanted to, let alone get him to sign the shoe I had brought (is that unprofessional? I thought it was until I saw some lady from CBC newsworld getting Nash to sign a ball and a jersey for her son before she interviewed him). At around 8 that night, I was in the Coal Harbour area, trying to find somewhere to sit down and get something to eat when Nash walked right by me. I still had the shoe in my bag and I caught up with him and he signed it for me. I was a little apprehensive about approaching him, since he was with his dad and they were talking, but I did it anyway, because I'm a dick like that, I guess. So all in all, Friday wasn't a total waste. The shoe now proudly sits in my living room.



The players were supposed to get their headshots done for the game on Saturday morning, since only Devin Harris had shown up on Friday. I was at the Westin at 9am, hoping to run into Denham Brown, the kid from Toronto who was drafted in the second round by the Sonics. I wanted to get a story on him for hooplife. Denham never showed, but the two kids from the message board did. Today the girl wore a skirt and a LeBron James high school jersey. Ironically enough, the Mike Bibby lookalike rocked a Bibby grizzlies jersey. The players weren't showing up and my patience was wearing thin, especially when the kids from the message board started coming up with creative ways to say my name: Chris-plosive, Chris, y'all, Crickity Chris, and finally, Chris-tal, the one they liked the most. The capper on my morning came when the two of them asked me if I blazed. I gave them a no, along with a mental, "Are you fucking kidding? Right now? Jesus Christ, get it together, it's like 10am. Fuck!" They came back ten minutes later, reeking of pot and started talking with me. Of course, this is when a PR lady walks by, smells the pot and scowls at the three of us. I left after that. On my way out, I ran into Nash, who very kindly turned down my interview request. Normally I'd have been mad at this, but he comes across as such a nice guy that I almost believed him when he said maybe he could do it later. I felt like a hack, so I left.

From here, the trip picked up. I made my way over to a shoe store and picked up these incredibly hot Air Jordan IV's. Note the little Mars Blackman on the heel. Totally makes the shoe.




I got to GM Place at 4pm to pick up my pass, only to find out that the same lady who wouldn't give me any time with Nash on Friday hadn't put me on the list of people to get passes. Thanks to the Nike guy who sets me up with shoes, who I fluked out and ran into on the way in, and some persuading on my part, I got a pass. The first person I saw in the corridor when I got in was Nash, who greeted me like he knew me. I'm not sure if he remembered me from earlier in the day or not, but it was cool nonetheless.

The game was good, as good as a charity game can get anyway. I made some contacts, got the interview I wanted with Denham Brown and talked with Mo Pete and Charlie Villanueva as well for an upcoming Slam story, which I didn't even think of doing until I was in the locker room after the game. Oh, and I got a picture with Mike Finley, a guy who gets shoes made for him exclusively by Jordan Brand. Sure, it was crossing the fan/reporter line, but when the cameras stopped rolling after Nash's post-game conference, 3/4 of the people in the room did the same thing, so I don't feel bad about it. The pic's not a good one, but here's me and Finley.



I was back in Edmonton about 12 hours later, ready to spend the last few weeks in my crap shack, where hopefully the lobby of the building will stop smelling like shit.

BAM

Getting to the bottom of things

I woke up yesterday morning at 4:51am. I had a mission. After a year of comparisons from Gateway folk, I was going to get the definitive answer from the man himself. The question would be, "Hey Steve Nash, do you think we look alike?" I'll explain. A few weeks ago, I got an email from the guy at Nike who gives me free shoes. He invited me out to Vancouver to check out the Nike Skills Academy, where the top 20 high school players in the country get instruction from some of the country's best coaches and for a day, from Nash himself, who's in Vancouver for his charity game on Saturday. He told me that availability was limited, but he'd do what he could to get me some one on one time with the MVP. So yesterday morning, I touched down in Vancouver at 8am, camera in hand to ask Steve Nash what it was like to look like me. I got to UBC (where the camp's being held) a couple hours early and saw this:

Steve Nash shaved his fucking head ten days before I met him, thereby destroying any leeway I thought I'd have in the interview with him. At this point, all I can do is shave my head before his charity game on Saturday, and hope that he says, "Hey, that guy looks like me. Take 300,000 dollars, it's nothing to me. I signed a 60 million dollar deal with Phoenix. I'm the MVP."
Updates to come on Saturday.

What did they bring to the brainstorming session?

Whatever it is, I want to smoke some of that!

Crap Shack: Taiwan (epilogue)

I just realized that I forgot to mention that I saw a MINI limo when I was in Taiwan. Though I wasn't quick enough to get a picture when the real object drove by, a quick google search proved that it wasn't a figment of my imagination. Behold, the funniest oxymoron on wheels!



Also, because a limo is not a limo unless you can go all pimp-my-ride with it by adding a hot tub, the MINI limo also comes with a hot tub option.



Skanky ho and Mystic Tan not included with the hot tub.

The Crap Shack revolution will not be televised

It's common knowledge that I don't live in a great apartment complex. It's dirty, smelly at times, the elevators suck, and someone next to or beneath me blasts three tracks from Michael Jackson's Thriller album. Religiously. While there are an endless amount of characters in the building that have made it worthwhile to live here over the last year (White Trash Lady, One-Legged Woman, the friendly old guy on the 11th floor who smells like booze all the time, the bickering couple next door to me, even a former SFU football player on the sixth floor who I drove to the U a few mornings in the first semester), things have gone too far downhill for me to continue living here. I'll start with the internal problems and work my way out.

My apartment is too hot.
Over the last few weeks, I've had two fans (one in the bedroom, one in the living room) running continuously, to no avail. I'm living in a sauna, where sweat is as common as comfort should be. Also, there are holes in my window screens, which prevent me from opening my windows, unless I want to let bugs in. Needless to say, over the last few weeks I've had to bite the mosquito bullet.

The dripping faucet
As I type this, I can hear my sink absorbing what is now, after 10 months of living here, a stream of water pouring from the tap. The day I moved in, I told the manager that there was a leaky faucet. She looked at me like I was retarded and turned the tap back tighter. Brilliant. I've resorted to putting a face cloth in the sink to absorb the water while I'm sleeping at night so that I don't have to hear it, and run the risk of peeing in the bed (just to clarify, that hasn't happened yet).

They stole my fucking cupboard door

I've added the picture here as proof that I'm not just making shit up to be funny. During the winter, management went into people's apartments to check valves and stuff for the plumbing. I came home that day to see that my cupboard door was gone. I waited a day and nothing happened. I saw a manager and asked her where my cupboard door went. She told me they were probably fixing it. I never saw it again.

Because of the previous tenants, my Mom thinks I'm a junkie.
Back in September, my parents came to visit me shortly after I had moved in here. It was for two days, the same two days that I was trying out for the Bears basketball team. After the first night where I had puked my guts out into a garbage can, I came home and plopped on the couch, took notes on how I did, and didn't move for a few hours. My parents were here with nothing to do, so they started cleaning my kitchen (the entire apartment was moderately clean, at best, while the kitchen was the worst room out of all of them). My mom opens up a drawer and asks what's in there. I tell her it's my junk drawer: hammers, wrenches, screwdrivers, stuff like that. The last person here before me used it for his junk drawer too, and kindly donated his belongings when he left. My mom's going through it when she shreaks. "WHAT IS THIS?!" I sit up, the most movement I've had since getting home that night, to see my mom holding Visine and a pack of Zig Zags. I'm not sure if her and my Dad ever really believed me that it wasn't mine.

The elevators force us to rise up

This might be my favourite pic taken in this building. Look at the anger, the unwillingness to pay rent, and the blatant effort to get everyone in the building to not pay rent. Why, you ask? Just over the elevators being down? What if I told you that those elevators were down for almost four straight days? Keep in mind that I live on the top floor of the building. While it's just a nuisance to me (I carried groceries up the stairs on Sunday night, that's the worst thing that happened to me), I was seriously worried about the tiny old woman I saw walking up the stairs (she was up around 6, I think) when I was leaving the building.

Stairway to hell
Having to walk the stairs wouldn't be that bad if it didn't stink like a men's room at a trucker stop. On my voyage from the top to the bottom, I've found loads of dirt, cigarette butts, a condom wrapper, what looked to be the pine needles off of a Christmas tree and the new trend at Grandin Tower, discarded garbage. Apparently if you throw your garbage in the stairwell, it's no longer your problem to deal with. The other night I found a box that had discarded ribs in it. Over the weekend I saw three neatly-tied Safeway bags. I don't know what was in there, but I pray it wasn't diapers.

It was the combination of the elevators and stairwell that have prompted me to find a new pad. In August, I'll be moving from my Crap Shack to the tranquil surroundings of Callingwood, where I'll be renting my sister and brother in law's condo from them. It's a big move, all the way out to the West end, but it's got to be done.

If they try and charge me for the cupboard, I'll burn this building down.

Crap Shack: Taiwan

Without Taiwan, Ang Lee wouldn't have existed. Without Ang Lee, the world probably wouldn't know that cowboys can be gay. And without gay cowboys, Crash probably would have won the best picture Oscar ... wait a minute...

Anyway, Taiwan, as a place where the bubble tea was invented and parliamentary fights degenerates into all out food fights, has many tasty goodies to offer. (As a side note, Taiwan's parliament is astonishingly colourful. During my short four-day stay, the Prime Minister—who, btw, was re-elected by a narrow margin following a possibly-dubious assassination attempt on him only hours before the election—and his wife were accused of taking bribes in the form of department store gift certificates. There's also another parliamentary fight that resulted in somebody's wig ripped off. The 24-hours news channels are easily the most entertaining channels on the island.)

A sample of what the street vendors of Taiwan has to offer includes fried chicken pieces the size of my face,


enormous ice cream cones (notice the bottom of the ice cream has started to melt as my mom tried to tinker with my phone camera. There was like an extra 5 inches when I first got it.)


and candied fruits (I didn't buy it because the red glaze looks sketch.)



Aside from that, I also saw a couple on the metro with matching clogs.

Lazy dreamer

It's been a month since I've contributed to the blog and even though nothing's really happened to me that's worth blogging about (unless interviewing Slayer counts), I had a dream last night about a fellow Crapshacker so I thought I'd share. For some reason, Iris and I were right in the front row on the first balcony at the Jubileee Auditorium. We were watching a rock show and then the anonymous male performer came down off the stage and walked up the aisles below us. Dream Iris was a huge fan of the rocker so she went nuts and tried to hang off the balcony to get closer to the rockstar. Except she stumbled and ended up dangling head first off of the balcony, with Dream Me holding onto her legs trying to pull her back to safety. This is were the dream gets sad, but actually eerily accurate. As Dream Iris' legs were slipping through my hands, I ended up holding onto her feet and shoes. Here's the accurate part: the shoes were fantastic--shiny, black patent-leather pumps. The sad part? I dropped Dream Iris and then I woke up.

Boston Tse Party (2/3 ready)

So far, the Crap Shack has deviated from its main mission statement--that is, to record the painfully exciting/unexciting life of my Boston roommies--and has veered towards pictures of crazy-ass insects and hot shoes. Well well, we should be back on track soon as the search for my real Boston roommies is now 1/3 over.

I found him through the university roommate list--which, btw, is alarmingly similar to personal ads. Moving into the real crap shack next year is one Fred E (last name blocked out for the sake of privacy).

The good: he's from Luxembourg, and therefore his presence will give the house an European flare. Maybe he'll wear a beret.
The bad: google searches of Fred turned up NOTHING. I refuse to believe that, in a world where we can dig up a picture that Jenny drew when she was 10-years-old, there are no digital evidence of my future roommate. Is he made-up? Is he real? Will he pay his share of the rent on time? Also, importantly, is he into this whole "blogging" and "sharing you daily life with strangers/my Edmontonian friends" business?
The AWESOME: Fred knows French, German and Swedish. Not only will the (real) crap shack be as international as an IHOP, I'm going to make him read the IKEA catalogue out loud and explain the meaning behind every furniture name. And if Natalie and Jenny come visit, the house will be a mad cacophony of foreign languages. RAD!

One down, one more roommate to go.